Serious Games
'''Definition '''[[www.b-i-t-online.de/daten/BIT Innovativ 28 Auszug.pdf|Definition "Serious Games"]] Last visited June 1st, 2016 "Serious Games" are games in which players shall learn while playing. It is a combination of digital entertainment and serious transfer of knowledge. Players shall learn something they can use in their everyday life. These games "have an explicit and carefully thought-out educational purpose and are not intended to be played primarly for amusement." (Clarke C. Abt, 1968) Ben Sawyer, co-founder of the "Serious Games Initiative", defines "serious games" as "any computerized game whose chief mission is not entertainment and all entertainment games which can be reapplied to a different mission other than entertainment." '''The Origin of Serious Games''' [//http://www.ludoscience.com/files/ressources/origins_of_serious_games.pdf ''Origins of Serious Games''] Last visited 30th May, 2016 The first use of “Serious Games” which are close to the meaning nowadays can be found in Clark Abt’s book “Serious Games” (1970). Abt was a researcher in the US research laboratory during the Cold War and one of his goals was to use games for training purposes and education. He developed several computer games (e.g. T.E.M.P.E.R.) for military officers to study the conflict of the Cold War. He also created non-digital math-games for school. Another non-digital game was presented in “The new Alexandria Simulation: A Serious Game of State and Local Politics” by Donald R. Jansiewicz (1973). The game should teach students the basics of the US political mechanism and is still used in classrooms due to some reissues in 2004. Later a study from Kahn & Perez (2009) observed that the game improves the learning outcome for students in “Introduction to American Politics” courses. The current wave of “Serious Games” seems to start in 2002 even though a lot of games were designed for serious purposes before. The first game with massive commercial success was “Pong” by “Atari”. Invented games in the past included serious purposes, e.g. illustrate scientific research study, train professionals or broadcast a message and were not primarily used for entertainment. There are six areas in which Serious Games were used: '''Education: '''One of the most famous examples is “The Oregan Trail” (1971) by “Minnesota Educational Computing Consortium” (MECC) which started as a text-only game by three history teachers called Don Rawitsch, Bill Heinemann and Paul Dillenberger. The player plays the role of an American pilgrim in 1848 and has to reach the Oregan Trail. On the road there are several obstacles and information related to American History. Due to its success a graphic version was published in 1978 and several sequels followed after it was commercially released in 1985. '''Healthcare: '''A game which was developed to teach kids how to manage diabetes was called “Captian Novolin” (Raya Systems, 1992) where the player is a diabetic superhero who has to take care of the glucose-level while beating evil junk food aliens. This game later was analyzed in clinical trials and it can be observed that kids who played “Captain Novolin” were better at managing their diabetes and the number of cases where children need to get to hospital due to glucose crisis decreased by 77% compared to those who never played this game. '''Defense: ''' The US Army showed a lot of interest in entertaining video games for its training purposes and they hired “Atari” to create a more realistic version of the popular game “The Bradley Trainer” (Atari, 1981) where players control a tank in a 3D world and have to shoot opposing vehicles. Atari accepted the deal even though a lot of developers were clearly against it because they do not wanted to create a game which “train[s] people to kill”. '''Art & Culture: '''“Versailles 1685” (Cryo, 1997) carries the player back to Versailles during the reign of Louis XIV. The player has to investigate and identify who is threatening to destroy Versailles. The game was very popular and over 300 thousand copies were sold. '''Religion: '''A game focused to teach Christian religion is “Captain Bible in the dome of Darkness” (Bridge Stone Multimedia Group, 1994). The game is set in a futuristic world with robots that are telling lies to the hero e.g. “you don’t have to serve god […] you can be you own master”. Throughout the game the hero has to collect bible verses to counter those statements. '''Corporate Training and Advertising: '''“Pepsi Invaders” (Atari, 1983) is the same game as “Space Invaders” but all aliens are replaced with the letter “P-E-P-S-I”. This game was developed for “Coca Cola” employees and has a game limit of 3 minutes so they do not spend too much time playing it. The company “Kraft” used a game called “Kool Aid Main” (Mattel Electronics, 1983) to promote their drink “Kool Aid”. '''Serious Games in language learning and teaching – a theoretical perspective''' ''Birgitte Holm Sørensen & Bente Meyer (2007)'' * Serious Games are defined as digital games and equipment with an agenda of educational design and beyond entertainment. Serious Games have learning as a distinct keyword and include, among others, learning games, educational games, training games, business games, and games promoting physical play; and they cross a variety of topics, target groups and contexts. * We define educational design as comprising Dale’s three levels: practice level, organisation level and the theoretical reflection level (Dale 1989, 2000). Design as a concept can be defined as the plan or the model of what should be produced. * Since Serious Games to a large extent involves the student and brings production into focus, project pedagogy is a theoretical approach that is central for further development. * Formal learning is for children and adolescents mainly linked to school/educational centres and learning is a goal for the activities that take place. The informal learning is characterised by taking place primarily outside school and is a means of acquiring capability and knowledge in relation to activities such as being able to play computer games, chat and create blogs. In order to play the children have to learn something. * In relation to the educational design of serious games informal learning is an important element to be integrated, as it involves play and therefore gaming is supplied with the motivating factors of play. * g. In language teaching games have often been used to stimulate motivation and authentic communicative practices, as games have been conceptualised as the “the fun factor” of language learning. * The role of languages in children’s off school activities should be understood in the context of what Warschauer and Kern have described as paradigmatic shifts in the history of language teaching with technologies. * summed up in the claim that the role of technology in language learning has been moving away from an association with drills, grammatical explanations and translation tests, into more communicative based contexts where task-based, projectbased and content-based approaches are integrated with technologies. As argued by Kern and Warschauer (2000, 1) language teaching has in this process not only become considerably more complex, but also “more exciting” (ibid.) * Two main conclusions from the research project Children growing up with interactive media – in a future perspective that affected the game-based design of LAB were: 1) children live in both physical and virtual spaces, and 2) children mainly make use of the digital media in their leisure time and they learn to use digital media primarily from other children and through their own experiments. * it is important for children to be able to act in games when the completion of the game depends on their actions, strategies, choices and decisions. * a set of concepts which seem central in the development of learning games (Sørensen 2002): • Challenges – to be confronted with a problem you have to solve * • Reification – to create, produce and make experiments * • Socialities – to communicate and take part in communities and social networks * • Achievements – to get acknowledgment and enjoy respect * • Pleasure – to interact in sensitive and pleasurable situations * • Exploration – to explore and act on basis of curiosity * • Self interpretation – to search and experiment identitiey '''Didactics'''[http://www.seriousgames.de/?page_id=190 "Serious Games Didaktik" ] Last visited June 12st, 2016 In Serious Games the learning process is subliminal and players learn aspects in the game actively by working with them. Serious Games incorporate didactic elements in computer games to impart learning content in an efficient and entertaining way. In addition they utilize the “play instinct” of humans to motivate the players intrinsically so the learning content stays interesting (e.g. compete with others in a competition). Challenges should be appropriate to guarantee that the game is not too easy or too hard and should provide constant achievements to encourage the player to spend more time exploring the game. Serious Games also integrate all senses and create an enjoyable learning atmosphere where the player can try and can experiment to find the necessary solution without fearing consequences. Important terms: * '''Flow''': Knowledge is acquired in a playful way and the player acts actively finding solutions to clear the game by “diving” deeper and deeper in the playing world. * '''Immersion: '''Perception of deepening into the game’s reality while not paying attention to the learning process and other cognitions * '''“Virtual Reality”:''' Game creates interactive surroundings in real time in which the player can manipulate, change or interact with the world or certain aspects of the game. Therefore immersions while gaming are more intense than watching a movie. * '''Incentives: '''Motivate player to obtain optimum performance e.g. to unlock achievements, extra content, more useful and powerful items etc. References